By Eric Vandenbroeck and co-workers

The Ongoing Dilemma of Jammu and Kashmir

On Nov. 3, at least 11 shoppers were injured in a grenade attack on a flea market in Srinagar, the summer capital of the Indian union territory of Jammu and Kashmir. One woman later died from her injuries. It was just the latest terrorist incident since a new government took office in mid-October. In Jammu, the predominantly Hindu part of the territory, terrorist attacks have killed at least 44 people this year, including 18 security personnel.

This territorial conflict over the Kashmir region, primarily between India and Pakistan, and also between China and India in the northeastern portion of the region. It is a dispute over the region that escalated into three wars between India and Pakistan and several other armed skirmishes. India controls approximately 55% of the land area of the region that includes Jammu, the Kashmir Valley, most of Ladakh, the Siachen Glacier, and 70% of its population; Pakistan controls approximately 30% of the land area that includes Azad Kashmir and Gilgit-Baltistan; and China controls the remaining 15% of the land area that includes the Aksai Chin region, the mostly uninhabited Trans-Karakoram Tract, and part of the Demchok sector.

It is generally accepted that Kashmir is a victim of the disputed division of British India during the transfer of colonial power in 1947. A border was created on religious lines, and states with a Muslim majority formed the newly created Pakistan alongside a predominantly Hindu India. When India and Pakistan became independent, it was generally assumed that Jammu and Kashmir, with its 80 percent Muslim population, would accede to Pakistan, but Kashmir was one of 565 princely states whose rulers had given their loyalty to Britain but preserved their royal titles. The partition plan, negotiated by the last viceroy, Lord Mountbatten, excluded these princely states, which were granted independence without the power to express it.

Initially, the British created the state of Jammu and Kashmir from a disparate group of territories shorn from the Sikh kingdom placing it under the rule of a Dogra raja, and during the late nineteenth century, they directly intervened in the administration of the state. The consequent land settlement of the region led to the breakdown of the state monopoly on grain distribution, the emergence of a class of grain dealers, the creation of a recognizable peasant class, and the decline of the indigenous landed elite. Additionally, the slump in the shawl trade beginning in the 1870s meant that shawl traders were in a state of financial and social decline by the late nineteenth century. At the same time, the Dogra state became more interventionist, and centralized, and the "Hindu" idiom of its rule became increasingly apparent.

But contrary to popular belief, it was not the isolation of the Kashmir Valley that produced narratives of regional and religious belonging; rather, it was the Valley's links with the world outside that helped reinforce the poetic discourse on identities in the mid-eighteenth to early-nineteenth centuries.

 

Rather, the axiom of Kashmir as the paradise on earth, which even then belied the reality of the condition of the Valley and its inhabitants, was coined by the Mughal emperor Jehangir.1 

The 1947 Partition created two newly independent states - India and Pakistan - and triggered perhaps the most significant movement of people in history, outside war and famine. About 12 million people became refugees. Between half a million and a million people were killed in religious violence and rhetoric that continues today.

The partition of India in August 1947 was, to a degree, related to British concerns about the possibility the USSR could acquire influence.

 

The Situation as It Is Today

The former state of Jammu and Kashmir - now divided into two federally administered territories - is holding its first assembly election in a decade. The third and last phase of voting is on Tuesday and results will be declared on 8 October.

Since the 1990s, an armed separatist insurgency against Indian rule in the region has claimed thousands of lives, including those of civilians and security forces. Earlier, elections were marred by violence and boycotts as separatists saw polls as a means for Delhi to try and legitimize its control. The high voter turnout now signals a change - people here say they have waited long to be heard.

“The level of poverty in our area is severe,” says 52-year-old Mohammad Yusuf Ganai after casting his vote. He laments that the lack of jobs has forced educated young Kashmiris to "sit at home". The last elections a decade ago resulted in a coalition government that collapsed in 2018. Before new polls could be held, Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government revoked the region's autonomy and statehood, sparking widespread discontent among Kashmiris.

For five years, Jammu and Kashmir has been under federal control with no local representation, and this election offers people a long-awaited chance to voice their concerns.

“We will finally be able to go to the elected official with our problems,” says 65-year-old Mohammad Abdul Dar.

BJP candidate Engineer Aijaz Hussain (centre) says people in Kashmir have faith in the election process now

One argument offered by Indian security officials holds that the powerful Pakistani security establishment, which has never reconciled itself to Indian rule in any part of Kashmir, has ramped up its support for terrorist actions. Islamabad may seek to convey a message that it can undermine newly elected Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah. He is the vice president of the regional National Conference, the party with the longest lineage in Kashmir, and the scion of a noted Kashmiri political family.

Pakistan—and particularly its security apparatus, which has long controlled policies on the Kashmir question—has been smarting since Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) revoked Article 370. Removing the region’s special autonomous status made good on a long-standing electoral promise and turned Jammu and Kashmir into a union territory, bringing it mostly under the control of the national government.

The BJP hoped that this would not only undermine Pakistan’s claim to Kashmir but also end simmering secessionist sentiment in the region as citizens reconciled themselves to the new status quo. Pakistan vigorously protested the 2019 decision, including at the United Nations, to little avail. Five years later, with an elected government now in place in Jammu and Kashmir, Islamabad’s security establishment may have decided that now was the moment to sow discord in the region once again.

However, some analysts attribute the resurgence of terrorist violence in Kashmir to a different source, arguing that the recent uptick may be locally organized rather than inspired and abetted by foreign forces. In this view, policies in the territory after the revocation of Article 370 contributed to popular discontent and spawned indigenous militancy; the quashing of dissent has fueled resentment against the high-handed tactics of the Indian state.

BJP candidate Engineer Aijaz Hussain (centre) says people in Kashmir have faith in the election process now

The BJP government insists that scrapping the region’s special status and placing it under direct rule has brought peace and development, with Prime Minister Modi announcing $700m (£523m) in projects during a visit in March. It’s now up to BJP candidate Engineer Aijaz Hussain in Srinagar's Lal Chowk to convince voters of this message.

“Previously, no one would go door to door [to campaign]. Today, they are. This is our achievement, isn’t it?” says Aijaz. He points to the increased voter turnout as proof of faith in the election process, with the recent parliamentary elections seeing record participation. Yet, despite these claims, the BJP did not contest those elections and is now only fielding candidates in 19 of the 47 assembly seats in the Kashmir valley.

The party’s stronghold remains the Hindu-dominated Jammu region with 43 seats, where it is hoping to score well. “Our organisation is weak in other constituencies,” admits Aijaz.

The Hindu nationalist BJP has been trying to make inroads in the Muslim-majority Kashmir valley, where it has had little presence.

 

The Current Violence

A third explanation attributes the recent spike in terrorist violence to Indian troop redeployments. The Modi government has moved a substantial number of soldiers from the Kashmir Valley—the principal locus of terrorist activity in the region—to the Himalayan front, where India has been engaged in a standoff with China on the countries’ disputed border since a deadly clash in 2020. The specific number of troops who have been moved remains classified.

Of course, these three factors could be at play in Indian-administered Kashmir. Pakistan’s security and intelligence services may have returned to their support for terrorism in the region as a new state-level government was about to assume office. The inability of this government, which has not been granted police powers, to contain an upsurge in terrorist activity could hobble its ability to rule effectively. This could lead to losing popular support and contribute to political disenchantment and alienation.

Simultaneously, the administration in Kashmir before this year’s election added to the frustrations of Kashmiris, especially in the Kashmir Valley, cannot be dismissed. Despite the Modi government’s trumpeting promises of economic development in the region, little of it has occurred. (Furthermore, a rise in terrorist attacks will certainly challenge this narrative.) Among other matters, unemployment remains high, contributing to Kashmiri youth discontent.

The unhappiness of Kashmir Valley residents was palpable in the aftermath of the abrogation of Article 370. An Indian Supreme Court judgment last December to uphold the 2019 decision did little to assuage Kashmiri Muslims and heightened fears about an erosion of their rights. In August, reputed analyst Radha Kumar told the Diplomat that a sense of “alienation” from the Indian state had deepened in the region since 2019. For the most part, this year’s election at least gave Kashmiris an outlet to express their political sentiments; they now have high expectations of their new government.

Asserting an unequivocal causal link between the disenchantment of Muslim Kashmiris and the return of terrorist activity to the region may be difficult. However, this sense of hopelessness among a significant segment of Kashmir’s population may have contributed to the return of extremist violence.

While regional political parties promise change and say they are fighting for the rights of Kashmiris, how much influence will they have after these elections? Lawyer Zafar Shah anticipates friction between the federal administration and the elected government which will soon assume charge.

Before 2019, when Jammu and Kashmir was a state, the chief minister could enact laws with the consent of the governor, who was bound by the state cabinet’s recommendations.

Now, as a federal territory under a Lieutenant Governor (LG), the chief minister must get the LG's approval, especially on sensitive issues like public order, appointments and prosecutions. Power has shifted, says Mr Shah, as the LG won’t act without clearance from the federal home ministry.

“Whether the LG can create hurdles in the government’s working, that’s a matter to be seen when an actual situation arises,” adds Mr Shah. Despite the challenges, many in Kashmir hope these elections will give them a chance to finally have their own representatives to voice their concerns.

 

1. See also G.M.D. Sufi, Kashir: Being a History of Kashmir From Earliest Times to Our Own. 2 vols. New Delhi, 1974, vol. i, p. 295.)

 

 

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